Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in clothing but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Marta Swain, Founder and Owner of Clothing Matters, located in Grand Rapids, MI, USA.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
Clothing Matters provides apparel that reduces toxins in closets, communities, and ecosystems. We serve a diverse and discerning clientele who choose to improve personal, social & ecological well-being while discovering how good clothing can be.
Tell us about yourself
In 1996 I learned that cotton was the world’s most heavily treated crop with chemicals toxic to all forms of life but marketed as “the fabric of your life” through decades of the breast cancer epidemic. Since then, obscene and unprecedented amounts of polyester clothing have become primary sources of microplastic pollution in oceans, lakes, rivers, and every human body. 1000s of unregulated chemicals are used to make what people wear, including formaldehyde, heavy metal dyes, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), perfluorinated chemicals, and phthalates, many of which are persistent, hormone-disrupting and absorbable through the skin into bloodstreams, contributing to allergies, asthma, and cancer as well as immune, neurological, and reproductive disorders. For over 27 years, we've worked to get apparel--the 2nd most toxic industry in the world--into wellness and sustainability forums.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
Since 1996, Clothing Matters has served as a trusted source for tens of thousands of customers spanning four generations who have invested over $6 million into clothing choices that offset the apparel industry’s impact as the world’s 2nd biggest polluter of water and responsible for 10% of carbon emissions. Our LogoWear clients have prevented >12,000 lbs of insecticide from polluting >25,350,000 gallons of water and entering our ecosystem.
What's one of the hardest things that comes with being a business owner?
The biggest challenges of this venture have been: the immense amount of naïveté & ignorance in our society regarding how conventional apparel is produced the greed & hypocrisy in business, and that an industry as toxic & unethical as apparel has been constantly excluded from sustainability and health forums.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
- Be confident in your commitment.
- Don’t compromise your standards.
- Always keep learning and put your customers first.
Where can people find you and your business?
Website: https://www.clothingmatters.net/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClothingMatters/
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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